Svenja Leiber – författare

Winner of the 2015 Arno Reinfrank Literaturpreis"Ruven Preuk stands apart from the village, on an August day in 1911, and listens." Thus begins an epic bildungsroman about the life of Ruven Preuk, son of the wainwright, child of a sleepy village in Germany's north, where life is both simple and harsh. Ruven, though, is neither. He has the ability to see sounds, leading him to discover an uncanny gift for the violin. When he meets a talented teacher in the city's Jewish quarter, Ruven falls under the spell of a prodigious future. But as the twentieth century looms, Ruven's pursuit of his craft takes a turn. In The Last Country, Svenja Leiber spins a tale that moves from the mansions of a disappearing aristocracy to a communist rebellion, from a joyous village wedding to a Nazi official's threats, from the First World War to the Second. As the world Ruven knows disappears, the gifted musician must grapple with an important question: to what end has he devoted himself to his art?

Now in paperback, the epic tale of a violinist who must navigate the fractious world of early twentieth-century Germany.“Ruven Preuk stands apart from the village, on an August day in 1911, and listens.” Thus begins an epic bildungsroman about the life of Ruven Preuk, son of the wainwright, child of a sleepy village in Germany’s north, where life is both simple and harsh.Ruven, though, is neither. He has the ability to see sounds, leading him to discover an uncanny gift for the violin. When he meets a talented teacher in the Jewish quarter, Ruven falls under the spell of a prodigious future. But as the twentieth century looms, Ruven’s pursuit of his craft takes a turn. In The Last Country, Svenja Leiber spins a tale that moves from the mansions of a disappearing aristocracy to a communist rebellion, from a joyous village wedding to a Nazi official’s threats, from the First World War to the Second. As the world Ruven knows disappears, the gifted musician must grapple with an important question: to what end has he devoted himself to his art?Winner of the 2015 Arno Reinfrank Literaturpreis

A family drama, a portrait of a community devastated by ideology, a fascinating history of amber—but, above all, a tale of remarkable women fighting for their rights.Towards the end of the nineteenth century in East Prussia, a woman named Kazimira strolls the remote shores of the Baltic Sea, bringing home bits of amber that wash up on the beach. Her husband Antas is the region’s best carver, and he catches the attention of Moritz Hirschberg, the owner of a nearby amber factory. Antas rises through the ranks, but Kazimira has the best ideas for processing and cutting the stones. Although establishing a new mine on such shifting terrain is hazardous, the venture finally pays off. It brings success, but envy and resentment swiftly follow, as antisemitism and nationalism sweep across the German Empire. Kazimira soon learns she must go her own way, as the Hirshbergs are expelled and World War I shatters her son. Three decades later, at the end of World War II, she becomes the last witness of German war crimes committed on West Beach, formerly a place of prosperity and progress. At the dawn of the twenty-first century in Russia, a woman named Nadia operates an excavator in a massive open-pit amber mine until she is told to go sell trinkets alongside all the other shopgirls.In alternating passages weaving together vastly different eras across the span of a century and a half, Svenja Leiber’s Kazimira tells the story of the largest amber-mining operation in history. The lasting effects of this operation expose pressing questions: Where do hatred and violence come from? What happens when life is declared worthless? Beginning with Kazimira and her bold struggle for self-determination, this saga follows five generations of women who envision an alternative world.